


debris of broken glass

by enablelove



Series: the way you said i love you [10]
Category: Teen Wolf (TV)
Genre: Angst, Derek Leaves, I Love You, Isaac Never Left, M/M, Unhappy Ending For Now
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-09-19
Updated: 2016-09-19
Packaged: 2018-08-15 23:30:48
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,111
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8077549
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/enablelove/pseuds/enablelove
Summary: I love you said when the broken grass litters the floor.





	

**Author's Note:**

> This is an exercise in writing all of these [prompts](http://trash-by-vouge.tumblr.com/post/132858041745/the-way-you-said-i-love-you). All parts are **UNCONNECTED** unless otherwise stated. This is an unhappy ending, BUT we will pretend that it does work out for them. Just not in this part.

17\. When the broken grass litters the floor 

Derek looks around his loft and his whole body, mind, and soul ache as the recollection of memories of the past few hours filter through his brain. His mind quickly flips through scenes of the never-ending fight of the Alpha pack stragglers - those that didn’t leave after the whole mess with Deucalion. The four Alphas that charged while they were trying to finally settle into some semblance of order. The four Alphas that smashed everything around them, slashed skin, and scratched the wood floors. 

Derek is so done with this life, with constantly having to look over his shoulder for the next thing that goes bump in the night.

Scott’s pack had fought admirably. Scott’s pack, not Derek’s, and even thinking of that distinction stings. Stiles, Danny, Lydia, Isaac, and Kira – all using whatever tools they had learned since that fateful night of Peter biting Scott to fight back. They had dealt with so much darkness, pun completely intended, since that night. 

Derek fought too; he fought with everything he had. He let out the anguish and pain and hurt onto these random Alphas that thought they could decimate the Beacon Hills’ pack. They didn’t win, but it was close. Derek can still see where Kira was pinned as she tried summoning her power, where Scott was swiping at the two Alpha’s cornering him, where Danny and Stiles went toe to toe with another one, alternating punching and kicking. 

Lydia had finally screamed, shattering the remaining light fixtures and making the Alphas freeze. The rest of them were accustomed to it and used the distraction to their advantage, running the Alpha’s out of town. 

Only Stiles stayed behind. As usual.

“You okay?” Stiles’ voice comes behind him. 

This _thing_ between Stiles and Derek is still new and tenuous. Old fights and sarcastic remarks turned into hours of talking and realizing their perspectives weren’t that different. Derek was still a bit standoffish because he needed to be. He couldn’t let any part of his guard down…even if there was a tiny little voice at the back of his head that thought he was an idiot and that Stiles would never mess with him like that and that he should just let him in already. 

Derek stamped that voice down. 

“No,” Derek says, voice raw and honest and feeling absolutely broken, just like the shards of glass littering the floor around him. Derek can hear Stiles coming forward, glass crunching under his Converse, before he lays a hand on Derek’s shoulder, so reminiscent of the time Derek lost Boyd. Thank god Derek didn’t lose another pack member tonight, but they had been so damn _close_. 

“Hey, we made it. We’re fine, and they’re gone. We’re okay, Derek,” Stiles says, voice pitched low like Derek’s a colt that’s going to spook any second. Who knows, he might. 

“Yeah,” Derek says, voice flat and short. The warmth of Stiles’ broad hands seeps through his shoulder and it takes every ounce of self control he has not to turn around and engulf Stiles’ in his arm, inhale that delectable scent that constantly sings of compatibility, and never let him go. 

But he can’t.

“Derek, look at me,” Stiles pleads.

Derek can deny lots of things but a request like that is beyond him, especially with how weary he feels. He turns and meets Stiles’ worried gaze. Stiles’ hand moves from his shoulder to Derek’s bicep, and he squeezes the muscle lightly.

“Talk to me. What’s going on in that brain of yours?” Stiles’ asks, mouth tilting up in a familiar smirk. Derek just shrugs, because even he’s not quite sure what’s going on up there. 

“Let’s go to my house, get out of this mess, and curl up with Iron Man,” Stiles’ says, gently tugging Derek to move.

“No. I can’t. I need to go. Far away from here.” Derek’s sentences are abrupt and blunt, but he can’t think beyond the need to get out. He’d love to whisk Stiles with him, but he has a life here, and Derek can’t handle that life anymore. 

“What?” Stiles’ asks, confusion coloring his tone. 

“I need to leave.”

“But I love you,” Stiles’ voice is so soft you can barely hear it, but his heartbeat is steady and Derek can feel the truth of it in his bones. They haven’t said it yet, but Derek’s known and that just makes this harder, even if it doesn’t change his mind.

“I can’t,” Derek repeats, though all he wants to say is that he loves him too. 

That this thing between them, while new, takes Derek’s breath away every single fucking time. 

That every day it’s harder to not blurt out the words and beg Stiles to stay with him. 

That every time he passes a comic book store or sees a Batman or Star Wars logo, he just wants to smile because it makes him think of Stiles. 

_Smile_. 

When Derek barely even remembers how to quirk his lips in an upward direction anymore, but Stiles had made him do that – almost even full on belly laugh once or twice. 

But Derek would just ruin Stiles. 

While Stiles is nowhere near perfect, he’s still untarnished, and not as disenchanted as Derek is. Derek is murky and would just obscure the brightness of Stiles’ smile; he’d eclipse the good Stiles exudes with his ‘doom and gloom’ expression as Stiles so lovingly calls it. 

Stiles’ breath hitches and he squeezes tighter, trying to force Derek to stay or to talk about it and Derek knows he’d give in to his pleas in a heartbeat. He tears himself away from the hand that holds Derek through nightmares, from the hand that cards oh so gently through his hair during every kiss, from the hand that knows how to pull wicked sounds from his body, and drops a feather light kiss to Stiles’ lips, savoring it for a heartbeat, before walking out of the room. 

Out of the loft. 

Out of Beacon Hills. 

He has to fight to walk every step, though he can hear an anguished cry behind him. It’s better this way for now. He knows this moment will be a regret, but he can’t stop placing one foot in front of the other.

One day, he’ll be back. Once he’s fixed himself and gotten where the obscurity of his aura is brighter, he’ll come back. 

And if Stiles is ready for him, he’s never going to leave again. 

But until that moment, he has to go, his heart lodged in his throat as if it were the debris of glass instead.

**Author's Note:**

> I can't promise a sequel or a continuation. I can promise they DO live happily ever after. Eventually. This was therapeutic for me, so constructive criticism only, please.


End file.
